"The journey west, from the Missouri River to the Pacific coast, was made by some quarter of a million Americans during the 1840s and 1850s, and stands as one of the great human adventure stories of all time. When gold was discovered at Sutter's Mill, California, in 1848, the immigration took on an urgency and a scope that would never be matched again." "This work draws heavily from the diaries of 17 men and women who made the four month, 2,000 mile...

"This is the multi-faceted story of Colorado's ordinary, but brave, men and women who experienced many joys and pains while isolated in Colorado's high country. It explains the significance of their work, which rose and fell with the mining economy in the West, especially in Colorado. It tells the story of the evolution of small-scale mining in nineteenth-century mining days, into the twentieth-century, with its urban, industrialized, large-scale...

The Road that Silver Built, runs north and south directly through the San Juan Mountains of Southwestern Colorado - some of the most beautiful and rugged country in all of North America, if not the world. However, there would be no road today if it were not for the treasure chest of minerals that early-day prospectors found, for all the gold and silver that was discovered was worth nothing if it could not be economically transported out of the mountains....